The Delta Energy Center, a power plant about an hour outside San Francisco, was roaring at nearly full bore one day last month, its four gas and steam turbines churning out 880 megawatts of electricity to the California grid. On the horizon, across an industrial shipping channel on the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta, scores of wind turbines stood dead still. The air was too calm to turn their blades - or many others across the state that day. Wind provided just 33 megawatts of power statewide in the midafternoon, less than 1% of the potential from wind farms capable of producing 4,000 megawatts of electricity.

To hear business leaders and political candidates talk, proper industrial policy comprises only three elements: a fair tax system, a level playing field and "certainty. " So why is it that all three are about to be thrown out the window as a sop to oil, gas and nuclear interests determined to fillet the wind-power industry? The maneuvering in Washington is over a federal subsidy known as the production tax credit, which is worth 2.2 cents per kilowatt-hour to wind-energy producers.

August 15, 2012 | By Christi Parsons and Seema Mehta, Los Angeles Times

OSKALOOSA, Iowa - President Obama visited an Iowa farm Tuesday where a family grows corn and soybeans while also generating wind energy with several turbines on their 1,000 acres. Republican Mitt Romney spent time at an Ohio coal mine, speaking in front of hard-hat-wearing workers whose livelihood depends on continued demand for their often-maligned product. In grand terms, the fight between Obama and Romney over energy policy centers on the role of federal regulators in protecting public health and promoting particular industries for the good of the country.

August 14, 2012 | By Christi Parsons, This post has been updated, as indicated below.

OSKALOOSA, Iowa -- Nothing livens up a long road trip like a wisecrack about Seamus the dog. Inspired perhaps by his eight hours of driving the Iowa countryside this week, President Obama managed to work Seamus into a discussion of wind energy tax credits here on Tuesday. Seamus, of course, was Ann and Mitt Romney's family dog, the one they claim used to love being strapped in his carrier to the top of the car during vacation travel. The story has produced no end of ridicule from Democrats and inspired the organization of “Dogs for Obama.” Obama has stayed away from teasing Romney on the subject, but on Tuesday he couldn't resist as he was interpreting the Romney critique of his energy policy for a farm crowd.

OSAKALOOSA, Iowa - The presidential candidates turn to the topic of energy Tuesday as they travel to different battleground states with different interests in future U.S. energy policy. In Iowa, President Obama plans to talk about wind energy as he pushes Congress to extend the production tax credit for companies investing in this growing alternative source. In Ohio coal country, meanwhile, Republican Mitt Romney is expected to talk about Obama's “war on coal” and the strain he says it puts on an industry that helps to power the state's economy.

It seems there is a way to get conservatives to support government handouts: Hand them out to conservatives. As Times staff writers Alana Semuels aud Seema Mehta reported, Mitt Romney is getting himself into trouble with Republican voters in swing states such as Iowa by supporting a bedrock Republican principle: He wants to end the production tax credit for wind energy and force power producers to compete on an even playing field with no...

August 9, 2012 | By Kathleen Hennessey, This post has been updated, as indicated below.

PUEBLO, Colo. - President Obama kept the pressure on GOP opponent Mitt Romney on Thursday in a fight over a wind energy tax credit, as he stumped in southeastern Colorado, a hub of wind power. “At a moment when homegrown energy, renewable energy, is creating new jobs in states like Colorado and Iowa, my opponent wants to end tax credits for wind energy producers. Think about what that would mean for a community like Pueblo,” Obama told a crowd of about 3,500 people at the Colorado State Fairgrounds.

DES MOINES - It's an overriding conservative principle: Scale back government interference and let businesses survive or fail on their merits. But standing by that principle may hurt Mitt Romney in Iowa, a hotly contested swing state that could provide a crucial six electoral college votes in November. Romney recently upset many conservatives here by saying he would end a government tax credit that helps subsidize a burgeoning wind industry in the state. Some of them - farmers who earn tens of thousands of dollars a year for having wind turbines on their property - say they won't vote for Romney because of his wind position.

Supporters of a bipartisan effort to protect the American wind energy industry say that 37,000 U.S. jobs will be at risk this year if Congress fails to extend the production tax credits that have been vital to wind power development. The call for Congress to pass HR 3307, the American Renewable Energy Production Tax Credit Extension Act, was made during a teleconference hosted by three members of Congress, the American Wind Energy Assn. and TPI Composites, a Newton, Iowa-based wind blade manufacturer.

Mitt Romney wants to fire some people to save the economy. The “gas-hike trio” at the top of President Obama's Cabinet, to be precise: Energy Secretary Steven Chu, Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar and EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, whom Romney alleged Saturday night at an Illinois town hall have conspired to drive up the cost of gas to make solar and wind energy more competitive. "Of course we want a clean environment, of course we want to preserve species, but we can't have these regulators, who, in the name of regulation, in the name of protecting and securing, are really trying to kill enterprise," Romney said.